Compare and contrast

Our friend, Slasher George, does not have to seek his troubles.  Here, he is desperately defending bankers' bonuses:

Britain and the City look set to be the losers in the battle against the European parliament's plans to bring in the toughest restrictions on bankers' bonuses since the financial crisis began in 2008.

The UK appears to be leading a minority of just three countries that oppose a new rule which would limit bonuses to no more than 100 per cent of salary, or 200 per cent if approved by a super-majority of shareholders.

His argument is not helped by his chums at Barclays (here):

Five top bosses at Barclays will share a jackpot worth up to £17million despite being tainted by a string of scandals. 

Those in line for the ‘wildly misjudged’ bonanza include chief executive Antony Jenkins and Rich Ricci, the controversial investment bank boss.

Meanwhile, Big Dave is getting excited about the virtues of morality:

Speaking in Mumbai on the first day of a three-day trip, Cameron likened "aggressive" forms of tax avoidance by multinational companies to illegal tax evasion, saying that its most extreme examples raise questions of morality.

But it was only yesterday that his government's own morality was brought into question:

Small arms weaponry, ammunition and various other military equipment were among millions of pounds' worth of goods exported last year from Britain to Sri Lanka under licences for arms and other closely regulated exports.

Statistics taken from the British government's own database for strategic export controls show items ranging from assault rifles and shotguns through to weapons sights, pistols and ammunition were sold last year to the South Asian nation's government, which has been accused of extensive human rights violations in relation to its treatment of its Tamil minority and the suppression of armed separatists, who have also been acused of abuses.

And then Dave pushes helicopter sales, despite more than a whiff of alleged corruption.

All very confusing ...

Leave me alone!

I have been back in Scotland for less than 10 days and I have been deluged with phone calls (well, four of them actually) from young ladies with Indian accents offering to compensate me for having been mis-sold payment protection insurance.  Remarkably, they seem to know the amount of the loan involved, the purpose for which it was provided, the fact that the loan was timeously paid off and the amount of compensation to which I would be entitled, as well as my name, address and telephone number.

The only problem is that, other than for mortgage purposes (and that was in the dim and distant past from building societies), I have never taken out a bank loan.  Like any well brought up laddie, I was taught to save up for what you wanted.  And, as a (more or less) well paid civil servant, I was lucky enough not to need loans.

So why am I plagued by these PPI vultures?  Is it always like this over here?

 

How to get it so wrong

Beware ideologues!  Like this guy in City AM:

POLITICAL ideas have always been cyclical. When incomes are falling, the economy is flatlining, credit is scarcer, prices are rising and it is hard to find work, the public always turns against capitalism (or the mixed economy corporatism that these days passes for it); in boom times, it tends to be more relaxed about other people making vast sums of money.

But ideological shifts are not a given. They can be stopped and reversed by determined leaders – as Boris Johnson showed during his election campaign, for example – and by the right policies. The key problem is that many markets have become rigged by massive government interventions in every nook and cranny of the economy, creating inefficiencies, damaging growth and financing vested interests at the expense of the general interest.

Yeah, yeah.  Were the problems at the banks, from PPI mis-selling to LIBOR rigging, and above all from the 2008 combustion, caused by excessive government intervention?  Are the current difficulties in the meat industry caused by excessive government intervention?  You do not have to be of a leftwing orientation to believe that we would all benefit if the government and the regulatory authorities took a rather closer interest in what businesses are up to.

It's not just the banks

From here:

BP has awarded chief executive Bob Dudley an annual bonus worth £2.6m in shares and cash as a reward for the oil major’s performance in 2012, despite a slump in its profits.

Company performance deteriorates, but the bosses reward themselves.

   

Nagging away

Do you suppose that Ministers and the Food Standards Agency are sufficiently competent to deal with the horsemeat scandal?  Or are they forever condemned to remain behind the curve?  The Guardian reports:

Speaking earlier this week, environment secretary Owen Paterson said he hoped for "meaningful results" from the tests by Friday, but experts warned the flood in the demand is slowing the process down, and may shed little light on food safety even when they are delivered.

A source at one retailer said: "There are simply not enough labs in the world to get all the tests done that the FSA have asked for. We are trying to help, but it's just unrealistic." Another who attended the emergency meeting called by DEFRA into the horsemeat scandal added: "We told them [the Government] that it would be challenging to meet the deadline on Friday and they changed their position from wanting everything tested to just providing the results of tests we had already done."

The process of determining which species of animals are contained in a given ready meal sample typically takes around a day, but with the sudden surge of products to test, turnaround is up to about three days, according to one laboratory involved in the current tests.Research by the food and drink magazine The Grocer and analytics company BrandView has found more than 600 separate product lines in need of testing across just four of the major retailers – 150 branded lines and 433 own-brand products. As each product may require multiple samples in order to deliver a clean bill of health, this could represent a backlog of thousands of products across the country in need of testing.

However, when results arrive, they may offer less comfort than consumers intend. Each separate species must be tested for separately: if you don't look for a particular animal's DNA, you won't know whether it is present or not.

The FSA has only required the industry to look for traces of horse in beef products – so if the products were to contain lamb, pork, poultry or any other animal, this would not show in the results when they are published.

Consider it and weep.  Were there no officials in DEFRA or the Agency able to advise them on the inadequacy of the testing programme?  Or were Ministers and the Agency so desperate to be seen to be doing something (anything really) that they ignored (or did not ask for) advice?

Fashion

Hadley's advice on scarf-wearing for men:

The European knot: This is when you fold your scarf in two and stick the two ends through the loop and around your neck. A British man who wears his scarf this way engenders great suspicion from his fellow menfolk and no wonder: the knot is European, after all. If you wear your scarf this way everyone will think you're Eurotrash, which you probably are.

The Ascot knot: The over-hand knot, when the scarf is wrapped primly around your neck and then knotted properly up close to your neck and the two ends lie perfectly on top of one another. Hello, old Etonian and/or employees of GQ.

The twisty scarf loop: You twist your scarf and then tie it once close around your neck and then again, loosely knotting the ends together. You are either a foreign correspondent for a newspaper, or trying to look like one.

The drape: When you simply fling the scarf around your shoulders and don't bother tying it around your neck. You are a student who thinks he looks like Christian Slater in Heathers but actually is a bit more Tom Baker-esque in Doctor Who.

The single wrap, over shoulder fling: The scarf is wrapped once around your neck and one end hangs down in front and the other is flung over your shoulder. You like to imagine you are a nouvelle vague hero. You think you look "dashing". We'll leave it at that.

The single wrap, loose knot at the bottom: the scarf is wrapped once around your neck and then the two ends are tied loosely at the bottom. Fussy.

The loop and tuck knot: You take the scarf around your neck and hang both ends down your back equally. Then you wrap them over opposite shoulders, wrapping your neck, so they now hang over the front. Then you bring the two ends under the bit of the scarf that is wrapping your neck at the front, looping them over and then letting them hang down. You are Brian Sewell.

The double wrap: The scarf is wrapped twice around the neck, the ends hang in front of your shoulders. Absolutely acceptable; actively encouraged.

No. I'm not going to discuss my preferences.

 

News from a different planet

You may think that a basic annual salary of £1.1 million is more than decent, even astronomical.  But the high heidyins at the RBS beg to differ.  The Guardian reports:

The chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland on Monday described the pay of the bailed out bank's chief executive Stephen Hester as "modest", amid fresh scrutiny of bonuses in the wake of the £390m Libor fine.

Sir Philip Hampton said Hester – who can get up to £6m a year from bonuses on top of his £1.1m salary – was paid "well below the market rate of people working in banking" because his bonuses had not paid out in full. He was speaking during a lengthy session of the banking standards commission in Westminster, in which a senior RBS colleague admitted the bank had believed Libor rigging was "a mathematical impossibility".

..

Hampton, defending bonuses for Hester, conceded the chief executive had a "highly paid job" but that "his pay has been modest relatively". He had received just one bonus since joining in 2008, of £2m, which has yet to be paid out. Some £780,000 of that will pay out in shares next month.

Wouldn't it be nice if we could all aspire to a "modest" salary of £1.1 million (and never mind the bonuses)?  Even if we were totally unaware that our underlings were playing at naughty boys by rigging the Libor rates ...

 

Red Osborne

So the government intends to meet social care costs by freezing the threshold for inheritance tax:

The £1bn cost of the new cap – this sum is bound to rise massively – will be funded by a stealth hike in inheritance tax. Everybody with sufficient assets to qualify will pay far more in tax, regardless of whether they end up benefiting from state-financed care. This will be imposed by freezing the inheritance tax-free threshold of £325,000 until 2019, even though inflation on the retail price index is currently 3.1 per cent. By 2019, the threshold would probably have increased to £420,000 without the freeze; so this is a pretty massive raid and will hit many elderly folk and their children. In many cases, this will be very unfair: a family that cares for its own elderly relatives will be hit by the tax, even if they were able to avoid using institutionalised care.

Is it a stealth hike?  Not if everyone knows about it.

Is it unfair?  Do we really want inherited wealth to cascade down the generations, maintaining those and such as those in the position to which they have become accustomed?  IMHO, £325K plus 60% of the remainder should be more than enough for any set of heirs.

Quote of the day

Roberto Mancini bewails the testicular apparatus of his Manchester City players (here):

"When you are a top player you should take responsibility always," Mancini said. "It is not always the fault of the manager, the players should take the responsibility if they have big balls. If not, they can't play in a top team."

As the ladies would tell him, it's not the size of the equipment that matters ...

The boy done good - maybe

So he's a political paragon.  The Guardian reports:

Fuelled by copious cups of coffee from a brand-new Nespresso machine,David Cameron chalked up a Brussels first as he debuted at an all-night EU summit.

Looking mildly tired after 25 and a half hours on the go – with a two-hour "freshening up" break at 10am on Friday – the prime minister hailed his achievement in negotiating the first ever cut in an EU budget.

"The British public can be proud that we have cut the seven-year credit-card limit for the EU for the first time ever," he said before travelling home for dinner with his wife, Sam.

Not sure about the credit card analogy, but quibbling would be specious.  Nevertheless, it would be no surprise if the deal were to fall apart before next Tuesday,  But then a cynical old sod like me would say something like that ...

Naughty boys

It could have been worse:

Royal Bank of Scotland was handed a £390m fine on Wednesday for "widespread misconduct" in rigging the Libor rate until as recently as November 2010, two years after it was bailed out by the taxpayer and even after regulators had begun to investigate the key benchmark rate.

After all, UBS had to cough up £940 million.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane?

You need a vivid imagination to be a parliamentary sketch writer:

 Christopher Chope, one of the Tories who voted against gay marriage, wanted him, in the interests of equality, to offer civil partnerships to straight couples too.

Cameron wasn't going to fall for that. "I am," he declared, "a marriage man. I am a great supporter of marriage. I want to protect marriage, to defend marriage, to encourage marriage." Civil partnerships would only weaken marriage. I had a vision of Cameron as Marriage Man, a superhero who leaps into action whenever marriage – straight, gay or transgender – is under threat. He wears grey, striped, figure-hugging underpants, a black cape with tails, and a silk topper. Young folk would call him on his Marriage Mobe.

"Marriage Man, I want to marry my boyfriend, but my parents say he's a no-good waste of space. I need your help!" Faster than a Rolls trimmed with white ribbons, Marriage Man races to the spot, biffing the anti-marriage parents, kapow!

Sorry, got carried away there.

Justice

I have no sympathy for the wretched Mr Huhne but what exactly would be the point of sending him to gaol? The man's career has been destroyed and he faces massive legal costs.  I can/t see any purpose being served by detaining him at a cost to the public purse.

 

Quote of the day

Wee Georgie Osborne (here):

“From September this year, every customer of every bank in Britain will be able to switch their bank account from their existing bank to another one in seven days. All they will have to do is sign up to a new bank – and the rest will follow.

All the direct debits, the standing orders, everything will be switched for you with no hassle. This is a revolution in customer choice.”

Sure, just as soon as you have supplied proof of your identity and a fuel bill and all the other gubbins to avoid falling foul of the money laundering requirements.

   

La cerise sur le gâteau parisien

Apparently, a certain aging footballer has just signed for a Paris football team.  Le Figaro has the news:

En un an, le PSG est nettement monté en gamme. Désormais, Beckham est la cerise sur le gâteau parisien et non plus l'homme providentiel missionné pour faire entrer le club parisien dans une autre dimension. Zlatan s'y colle déjà. Dans ces conditions, la volonté qatarienne d'attirer le footballeur le plus célèbre de la planète pour accroître la valeur de son image internationale n'a plus besoin d'être corrélée à un pari sportif d'avenir. Ce qui a sans doute facilité son transfert à Paris.

I doubt if anyone in England has noticed ...

Cameron's new best friends

Well, his Algerian chums are not exactly democrats.  The Independent reports:

Known as "the dandy diplomat" during his 16-year tenure as the country's Foreign Minister in the 1960s and 1970s due to his Westernised sense of style, Bouteflika found favour with Western countries in his first term as President, having established a fragile peace and transformed Algeria's international image.

But allegations of corruption have also plagued Bouteflika. He spent six years in self-imposed exile in the 1980s following corruption allegations, and his election (plus subsequent re-election) has been marred by claims of vote rigging. In 2008, Algeria's parliament voted overwhelmingly in favour of scrapping a rule limiting presidents to two terms, making way for Bouteflika's third term.

Speaking at the time, Saïd Sadi, the head of small secular opposition party the Rally for Culture and Democracy, said: "We are living through a disguised coup d'état."

I just hope that Dave has taken a long spoon with him on his travels.

Should ...?

Do you agree that ...?   Such fine distinctions should matter?

Still, nice, for once, to see everyone in agreement.  Except, maybe, this guy.

   

Mid term breaks

It's all so difficult at home, n'est-ce pas?  The economy tanking, the coalition falling apart, the banks continuing to misbehave, and even the wife complaining.  Far better to get away to foreign shores, preferably warm ones:

The growing importance of the unrest in West Africa was highlighted last night when Downing Street announced the PM would be flying to Algeria tomorrow for urgent talks with Prime Minister, Abdelmalek Sellal.

Mr Cameron was already scheduled to attend a development conference in Monrovia, Liberia, but added the Algerian meeting following the recent hostage crisis at the Amenas gas plant which left six Britons and 47 others dead.

Number 10 said the discussions were likely to include the military campaign in Mali, a neighbour-state to Algeria.

These African johnnies know how to roll out the red carpet and treat one with respect.  So unlike the miserable sods in Brussels.  And far from the literal and metaphorical rain clouds of old Blighty ...

Mission creep

It is less than two weeks since Mr Cameron stated unambiguously that there would no British troops on the ground in Mali.  Now look at the latest position, as reported by The Guardian:

Britain is prepared to provide hundreds of troops to help the operation and is considering a few options:

• Forming part of an EU military training mission in Mali. The British contribution to this would be in the "tens", according to Downing Street.

• Training troops from the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) in neighbouring countries for possible operations on Mali. This is likely to be the main focus of Britain's contribution because Ecowas members include many countries with strong links to Britain. British troops could be used to train Nigerian forces.

• Providing "force protection" for the trainers. This would be armed protection but would not amount to a combat role.

Downing Street is adamant that British troops will play no part in combat. A spokesman said: "We have the capability and capacity to do that. We have the ability to contribute a sizeable amount if required."

Britain initially put two RAF C17 transporter aircraft at the disposal of France for the transport of troops and material to Mali. One of these is still dedicated to the Mali mission.

Britain has also sent one RAF Sentinel surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft to Senegal to help with the mission. The Guardian reported last week that a small number of British special forces soldiers were on the ground in Mali advising the French.

Aeroplanes need to be supplied and maintained; troops need to be equipped, housed and fed.  And experience has shown that training and advisory missions have a habit of expanding into other activities.

What are we getting into here?  What are the objectives?  What length of commitment?  And, crucially, how do we get out?

Worth seeing again (and again and again)

The Guardian has comments from the players involved.

More money than sense

From The Economist (here):

(Unaccountably, they appear to have omitted Hibs.)


   

All talk and no trousers

I see that, once again, our Prime Minister has been banging on about tax evasion.  (In Switzerland of all places!)  The Guardian reports:

"Companies need to wake up and smell the coffee, because the customers who buy from them have had enough," the prime minister told business leaders (video) at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

Protesters targeted Starbucks branches late last year after it admitted it had paid just £8.6m in corporation tax in the UK over the past 14 years. The firm subsequently promised to pay £20m over two years, amid fears of a consumer boycott.

Cameron's speech attracted strong criticism from the body that represents Britain's accountants, but the PM insisted he was the most "pro-business leader" you could find. He said it was not just NGOs that had been lobbying him to crack down on tax-dodging firms, but the upper echelons of the City too. "It's a world where some companies navigate around legitimate tax systems – and even low tax rates – with an army of clever accountants."

Cameron said there was nothing wrong with sensible tax planning, but "some forms of avoidance have become so aggressive that I think it's time to call for more responsibility and for governments to act accordingly". He said: "In the UK we've already committed hundreds of millions into this effort – but acting alone has its limits. Clamp down in one country and the travelling caravan of lawyers, accountants and financial gurus just moves on elsewhere. We need to act together at the G8."

Do you suppose that this means that the UK government will crack down of those of its dependencies, such as the Caymans, whose principal function appears to be acting as tax havens?  Or that they will reverse the cuts in HMRC staff numbers?  No, nor do I ...

Quote of the day

David Cameron (here):

"It is time for the British people to have their say."

Um, well no, not now.  The British people will have their say when I say they can have their say.  Probably late 2017.

     

There's a bad smell

If I were Frau Merkel or Monsieur Hollande, I would tell him to get on his bike.  The Guardian reports:

David Cameron will on Wednesday set a deadline to hold an in-out referendum on Britain's membership of the European Union by the end of 2017 as he hardens his position on the issue that has bedevilled Tory leaders for a quarter of a century.

To the delight of Eurosceptics, the prime minister will throw down the gauntlet to his fellow EU leaders to agree to a revision of Britain's membership terms within two and a half years of the next general election or risk triggering a British exit.

But Cameron is not Andy Murray, able to despatch Frenchmen without breaking sweat.  (Murray is 2 sets to love up at the moment.)  If our European partners disagree to a revision of the UK's membership terms, what then?  Aye well, there's the question:

Cameron will say: "Some argue that the solution is...to hold a straight in-out referendum now. I understand the impatience of wanting to make that choice immediately.

"But I don't believe that to make a decision at this moment is the right way forward, either for Britain or for Europe as a whole. A vote today between the status quo and leaving would be an entirely false choice."

All very complicated.  Meanwhile, for the next five years (at least), the shadow of Brexit hangs over the economy.  In these circumstances, why would Nissan or LandRover Jaguar invest in this country?

It appears that Le Pong does not emanate solely from Rouen ...

 

General Cameron

Yesterday evening, I was reading a rather splendid novel (The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie) and came across this passage.  It reminded me sharply of a certain politician:

"I think you would have made an excellent lieutenant, a passable captain, a mediocre major and a dismal colonel, but as a general you are a liability.  I think you know this, and have no confidence, which makes you behave, paradoxically, as if you have far too much.  I think you make decisions with little thought, abandon some with none and stick furiously to others against all argument, thinking that to change your mind would be to show weakness.  I think you fuss with details better left to subordinates, fearing to tackle the larger issues, and that makes your subordinates smother you with decisions on every trifle, which you then bungle.  I think you are a decent, honest, courageous man.  And I think you are a fool."

 

Conversation of the week

From The Guardian (here):

Cameron: Can someone tell me what's going on?

Osborne: Sorry Cams, old boy. There's no one from the civil service in Downing Street at the moment, so I don't have a clue either. You could look in the diary.

Cameron: I've done that, but it wasn't much help. Just something about making a very important speech about Europe on Monday.

Civil service: Actually, we've decided it's going to be on Friday instead.

Cameron: I knew that really. Can we rehearse what it is exactly I believe in?

Civil service: This may take a while …

Cameron: I believe … No, make that I firmly believe, that the European Union is both vital and entirely irrelevant to Britain's interests. So it is absolutely right that we should use this opportunity to place ourselves at the centre of Europe by trying to distance ourselves as far from it as possible …

Osborne: Total masterpiece ...

Cameron: And, in conclusion, it is right that the people of Britain should be allowed to have a referendum on our membership sometime long after the next election, by when I will be out of a job so I'm not too bothered one way or the other …

Counting the cost

The Independent is getting over-excited about the RBS:

British taxpayers are set to pay $800m (£500m) in fines as a result of Royal Bank of Scotland traders’ involvement in the Libor interest rate fixing scandal - with nearly all of the money going to the United States.

American watchdogs are set to hit RBS with as much as four-fifths of the total penalty as it becomes the third bank to settle over its traders’ role in the scandal.

...

RBS is 81 per cent-owned by the Government, which means the taxpayer will effectively foot the bill for its fine, although the bank is expected to attempt to head off protests by cutting its investment bankers’ bonus pool. 

Well yes, in a way.  The taxpayer will in theory have to meet four-fifths of four-fifths of the fine.  But only if you regard a loss on every transaction made by the bank as falling to be met by the taxpayer, while ignoring every element of transactional profit which might equally be said to fall to the benefit of the taxpayer.

Furthermore, as the value of the taxpayer's shares has risen by about 75% in the last six months (from about 200 pence per share to about 350 pence per share), it might be considered that the taxpayer is not doing too badly, even if the current value of the shares remains below the original cost of their acquisition.

So although the £500 million fine involves a lot of money (as well as substantial wrong-doing on the part of the Bank's traders), it is arguably misleading to consider it in isolation as a charge to be met by taxpayers.

The scorpion and the frog

I don't blame Goldman Sachs - or at least not wholly.  It's in its nature after all:

The great vampire squid’s move to even consider delaying bonus payments to some of its staff just to save them a few quid in tax indicates that it continues to live in a separate world to the rest of us.

More than that, it lives in a world beyond even most other powerful banks. Early reports on the matter said that other large finance firms had wondered whether they should wait for the tax rate to drop from 50% to 45% before paying out bonuses and quickly decided that it would look bad.

No, it's Slasher Osborne who deserves the opprobrium.  First, for reducing income tax for the very rich; and second for giving the world a year's notice before putting it into effect.

Foreign adventures

You may be interested to see this satellite photo of Mali (lifted from Wikipedia):

Mali is a huge country in West Africa, occupying 478,000 sq miles.  (By comparison, France is about half this size.)  Its population amounts to some 14.5 million, while gdp is less than $18 billion (cf French gdp of more than $2.2 trillion).  All of which has military implications.

I rather doubt if France (and the UK) will be able to get out of Mali as quickly as they got in.  Accordingly, we may hear a lot more about this poor country over the next five years or so ...

Ageism?

I am struggling to come to grips with the government's proposed new arrangements for old age pensions.

As far as I can tell, people who have already qualified for the pension or, like me, will do so before 2017 will not benefit from the new flat rate pension of £144 per week.  Instead, we will continue to get the existing pension of £107 per week.  (Both these figures will be uprated to reflect inflation.)  It is not yet clear to me whether the additional pension credit (payable to pensioners with very low incomes) which will be abolished when the new flat rate pension becomes payable will be retained for those having to live with the existing pension.

It is nevertheless obvious that the effect of the proposed arrangements will be to create two classes of pensioner: those who were already receiving a pension before 2017 and who will be stuck on a lower rate and those who will benefit from the new flat rate.  The former will of course be older than the latter.  This seems a strange way to introduce greater fairness into the system.

I need hardly add that what is proposed is unlikely to be welcomed by those of us wrinklies stuck on the lower rate.

Garment of the week

It has to be Nick Clegg's "onesie".

A bit inconvenient, I would have thought, when nature calls in the middle of the night.  But perhaps Nick is young enough not to be troubled by such matters as yet ...

   

The danger of being sarcastic ...

... is that people take you seriously.

What Sir Jeremy Heywood actually said was:

"We accepted there were unanswered questions including the possibility of a gigantic conspiracy or a small conspiracy. Those were unanswered questions. But we decided, on balance, to let matters rest as they were, decide to stick by Andrew Mitchell, keep him in post and move on."

Now you may consider that the reference to "a gigantic conspiracy" constituted mockery of the possibility.  But the press are more literally minded.  Thus The Guardian reports:

Britain's top civil servant believes Andrew Mitchell, the former chief whip unseated by the "plebgate" row, could have been the victim of a "gigantic conspiracy" involving members of the diplomatic protection group that guards Downing Street.

while The Independent takes a similar line:

Britain’s most senior civil servant was aware that the Government’s former Chief Whip Andrew Mitchell may have been the victim of a “gigantic conspiracy” when he was fighting to save his job - but did not raise his concerns with the police, it emerged today.

Perhaps this will teach Sir Jeremy that in future he should avoid being a smartarse.

   

When will they ever learn?

I am prepared to accept that public sector bureaucracies are not always terribly efficient, although I suspect that the alleged lack of efficiency has more to do with under-resourcing than with anything else.  But on the ideological principle of private sector good, public sector bad, this government seems determined to strike down long-established public institutions.  Here is the latest:

The justice secretary, Chris Grayling, is to outline plans for the wholesale outsourcing of the probation service with private companies and voluntary sector organisations to take over the rehabilitation of the majority of offenders by 2015.

The public probation service is to be scaled back and "refocused" to specialise in dealing only with the most dangerous and high-risk offenders and public protection cases. The majority of services will be contracted out on a payment-by -result basis.

You may discount the reference to voluntary sector organsisations; experience has shown that they are seldom big enough to act other than as sub-contractors to the Sercos, Capitas, A4Es and G4S's of the business, while cash-flow problems eventually drive the voluntary organisations into the ground.  And so another allegedly inefficient but well-meaning bureaucracy will be replaced by profit-driven private sector bureaucracies whose track record in terms of efficiency is at best patchy.  And all for what?  Does anybody, even in government, really think that a private sector probation service will deliver better results in terms of probation than the existing system?

Hot and bothered?

It's a tough old life, being a gas chief.  The Guardian reports:

The managing director of British Gas is set to leave the business with a pension pot, shares and basic salary worth more than £10m, amid public and political disquiet over soaring household bills.

Phil Bentley, who oversaw a 6% increase in bills this winter, is expected to confirm that he is stepping down this year. He is believed to harbour ambitions to become a company chief executive in his own right.

According to the annual report of Centrica, the parent of British Gas, Bentley has an interest in just under 2m Centrica shares, worth £6.65m at closing share price. The 53-year-old executive is also expected to depart with a year's basic salary, which came to £635,000 in 2011, along with his £3.6m pension pot.

...

Bentley joined Centrica as finance director in 2000 and was handed his British Gas role in 2007. Centrica declined to comment on Bentley's imminent departure.

At least, he won't have to worry about paying his fuel bills ...

   

Cooking the books?

Well, there's a surprise.  The Independent reports:

Pension savers face a serious blow to their retirement prospects with confirmation this week on changes in how the retail price index (RPI) is calculated.

The Office for National Statistics' reform of the RPI is expected to lead to rates of the key inflation benchmark coming into line with the traditionally lower consumer price index (CPI).

Is it not passing strange that reforms of the methods of calculating inflation always seem to have the effect of reducing inflation?


 

Talk is cheap

Do you believe that he'll actually do anything?  The Telegraph reports:

Foreign companies like Starbucks and Amazon which have avoided paying large corporation tax bills in Britain lack "moral scruples", David Cameron has said.

The Prime Minister said he was going to make “damn sure” that foreign companies like Starbucks and Amazon which have been found to avoid legally paying a large corporation tax in the UK paid their fair share.

We'll see ...  But don't get your hopes up.

Obélix among the Russians

Incroyable!  C'est pas vrai!

Impending chaos?

So.  A lot of middle class families may be upset.  But Slasher Osborne likes to kick his potential supporters in the teeth.  The New Statesman explains:

...  the first test for the government will come next Monday when the withdrawal of child benefit from higher earners begins. From 7 January, payments will be tapered away from individuals earning over £50,000 and completely withdrawn at £60,000 (however, as Labour is keen to point out, a household with two earners each on £50,000 will keep the benefit in full). Those households affected will either need to stop claiming the benefit or pay a new tax (known as the High Income Child Benefit Tax Charge) to cover the cost of the payments. Families will lose £1,055.60 a year for a first child and a further £696.80 a year for each additional child, meaning that a family with three children stands to lose £2,449.20 - the equivalent of a £3,500 pay cut (since child benefit is untaxed).

With the changes announced as long ago as the 2010 Conservative conference, the government has had no shortage of time in which to inform those who will lose out. But as today's Telegraph reports, almost a third of the families affected have still not been formally warned that they will no longer be eligible for all or part of the benefit. Of the 1.1 million households due to be affected by the change, 316,000 have not yet been contacted by the tax authorities. As a result, having missed the opportunity to opt out of the new system (as 160,000 have done), they will have to fill in self-assessment forms or face fines running into hundreds of pounds.

A spokesman for HMRC insists that "extensive advertising, media and online activity" means those affected will know about the changes. However, it's not hard to imagine that some families will get a nasty surprise when they discover that they owe hundreds of pounds in additional tax.

Aye, and don't expect HMRC to cope - even half adequately - with all those additional self assessment forms.  As usual, it will end in tears ...

 
 

Music for Hogmanay

And a good new year to all

A pneumatic bird-brain?

Michael Buerk thinks so ...

Will they? Won't they?

I suppose that many of them are about my age.  When we were kids, we watched flicks like Flash Gordon where, at the end of each episode, the hero would find himself in an impossibly dangerous situation (sometimes literally hanging from a cliff), only to retrieve his position at the start of the next episode.  But I can't see that happening with these guys:

US Congressional leaders have one more day to stop the threat of steep tax rises and spending cuts, known as the "fiscal cliff", after talks ended with no deal.

Senators will continue to seek a compromise deal on Monday to send to the House of Representatives.

Failure to reach agreement by 1 January could push the US back into recession.

Hey and not only the US.  I am tempted to wonder how Congress gets itself into these situations.  But that way lies madness ...

Best Christmas tv

It has to be the fabulous Lady and The Tramp on Christmas Eve.  Still available on the I-Player, if you missed it.  Just to remind you:

The British spirit

No, the world didn't come to an end.  The Guardian reports from Bugarach where aliens were expected to save the favoured few:

Ian Napp, a British former chef, had been photographed with an inflatable dingy in a field "just in case" there was a tsunami. Then he had gone home to get some clean underpants for the end of the world, but never made it back.

Obviously a man with the right priorities.

 

Woof, woof, George

So the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards is taking a tough line on ringfencing domestic banking from its casino equivalent.  This leaves Slasher George with a wee problem:

Mr Osborne stocked the commission with people like Lord Lawson, the former chancellor, Lord Turnbull, the former cabinet secretary, and Justin Welby, a former oil executive before rejecting mammon in favour of a career in the church that has led to him becoming Archbishop of Canterbury. And he put Andrew Tyrie, the chairman of the Treasury Select Committee, in charge. If he's surprised that this lot has gone off and done something he didn't expect he's really rather naive.

The proposals are actually sensible, and likely to be supported by people such as Sir Mervyn King, the governor of the Bank of England. But the real problem for Mr Osborne is that the people who have made them have a great deal of credibility.

If he ignores their recommendations, or tries to "game" them himself by watering them down, he runs the risk of being seen as the bankers' poodle. That's not a happy place to be.

Couldn't happen to a nicer fellow ...

   

We're all in this together?

You would not want him to stay in a hovel, would you?

Fresh details of the lucrative financial package required to lure the Bank of England’s first foreign Governor across the Atlantic show that Mark Carney, a Canadian, has landed a housing allowance worth £1.25m over his five-year term.

The £250,000-a-year agreement – signed off by the Bank of England’s non-executive directors – underlined the desperation of Chancellor George Osborne to get his man, leaving the Bank of Canada Governor with a total package worth £874,000 a year.

I suppose that we need to provide him with a sufficient housing allowance to enable him to become accustomed to living in a style that the rest of us can only dream of.  At least, I assume that's the rationale ...

Paddling in dangerous waters?

Plebgate rumbles on.  Rather surprised to see the Prime Minister come out so forcefully here:

Cameron said: "A police officer posing as a member of the public and sending an email potentially to blacken the name of a cabinet minister is a very serious issue. It does need to be seriously investigated."

Given that the officer concerned has been arrested, it seems to me that the PM is treading dangerously close to contempt of court.  Bearing in mind Cameron's expostulations, how can the officer be given a fair trial?

 

Chrissie prezzie

"Ooh!  How exciting!  60 placemats ...  Just what one's always wanted.  How imaginative!"

(Thoughts:  do these clowns not realise that Buck House is absolutely stowed out with placemats?  And of rather better quality than these offerings.  You just can't rely on the Tories these days.  Whatever happened to that nice Mr Douglas-Home?)

Daft as a brush

When I read the first sentence of this report, I thought that the proposed fine was somewhat excessive:

Manchester City are taking a substantial risk by going outside of disciplinary guidelines to fine Mario Balotelli £340,000, resulting in a legal case which could drag on into next year. 

Then, when I read the second sentence, I realised that it was just the crazy finances of football:

The Professional Footballers' Association (PFA) is surprised that City have charged the Italian with misconduct and fined him two weeks' wages, because guidelines they have put in place with all clubs and the Premier League do not entitle sides to fine players for a general accumulation of yellow and red cards – as the Premier League champions are doing in Balotelli's case.

So Balotelli is getting £170,000 per week.  For that kind of money, he should do precisely whatever the club tells him to do, even if it involves him standing on his head and singing "Just One Cornetto".

Bagehot re-visited

No, I don't like it.  Our ancestors spent centuries seeking to divorce the monarch from political influence and only partially succeeding.  Then this cabinet, with absolutely no sense of political history, think that it's a good idea to invite the Queen to attend cabinet as an observer.  Her Maj has an undeniable role in government, from opening parliament to signing off legislation.  But, for my lifetime at least, that role has been ostensibly decorative rather than practical.  By inviting her to attend cabinet, Cameron and co are messing up fine distinctions and long traditions.

Furthermore, it creates an unwelcome precedent.  As far as we know, the present queen has been admirably punctilious in observing the constitutional proprieties (at least until now).  But what of her successor?  Could we trust him to keep his mouth shut during a cabinet discussion?  Could he be relied upon to keep his distance from political decisions?

He's having a laugh

So what attracted you to Silvio, the short fat plastic 76-year-old hair-restored billionnaire?

Ridiculous

Reacher is 6 ft 5ins and weighs 16 stone.  How can he be played by someone of diminished stature, especially when that someone's acting ability is limited to three facial expressions?

Utterly disgraceful.  Russell Crowe would have been a much better choice.

 

Paying for Mummy and Daddy

Once upon a time, Tory MPs only became involved in sex scandals; financial misdemeanors were left to the Labour Party.  Alas, no longer - even Tory cabinet ministers appear unable to keep their accounts on the straight and narrow:

John Lyons, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, launched an inquiry after The Telegraph published details about the Mrs Miller's expenses this week.

Between 2005 and 2009, the Culture Secretary claimed the cost of the mortgage and other expenses associated with a South London property, which has been her parents’ home for “nearly two decades”.

Mrs Miller insists her expenses are "absolutely in order" but the watchdog has decided to look at whether there is a case to answer.

...

Mrs Miller today hit back at her critics in an interview with The Evening Standard, saying her expenses have been "audited twice independently" in a review of MPs by Sir Thomas Legg and another by the Conservative Party.

However, when asked whether those auditors knew that her parents lived in the property, she did not give a clear answer.

“I obviously spoke to the Fees Office about my claims and they were happy that everything was in order,” she said.

She also struggled to explain why she abruptly stopped claiming expenses for the second home in 2009, shortly before The Daily Telegraph broke the MPs’ expenses scandal.

“Because I think there was a lot of concern about the rules and, a lot of concern about, you know, the whole issue, and it’s something I felt that I didn’t want to be, sort of, mixed up in, the fact that I," she said, before adding: “I just made that decision.”

It's a bit weak, to say the least   Would it be unfair to describe the lady as a scrounger on the public purse?


   

Going against the flow

I can't help feeling that, regardless of the merits of their case, those politicians opposed to same sex marriage are finding themselves on the wrong side of history.

I know opinion polls are not everything but these seem comclusive:

A new Ipsos-MORI poll for Freedom to Marry has found that three-quarters of voters support same-sex marriage. The most popular choice – 45% – was that gay people should be allowed to get married to each other but religious organisations should not be required to provide wedding ceremonies to gay people.

But a further 28% of voters thought that gay people should be allowed to get married to each other and religious organisations should be required to provide wedding ceremonies to gay people.

This means nearly three quarters of voters – 73% – want to allow gay marriage while less than a quarter – 24% – do not. Only one in six voters – 17% - thought that gay people should not be allowed to get married but should be allowed to form a civil partnership.

And I was intrigued to see that, in England at least, those of us who are not married now constitute a majority of households.  But if those who are gay seek to join the diminishing tribe of married couples, why put barriers in their way?  I'm one of the growing minority, however, who are godless heathens, so I cannot be expected to understand.

   

Mounting up

June 2012 -  Barclays fined £290 million for Libor manipulation

Dec 2012 -  Standard Chartered fined £415 million for breaching Iran sanctions

Dec 2012 -  HSBC fined £1.2 billion for laundering Mexican drug money among other transgressions

And there's more on the way ...

The life of a jetsetter

It's not all foie gras canapes and campari cocktails on the terrace, you know.

In preparation for my return to sunny Spain this afternoon, I've had to submit electricity and gas meter readings, empty the fridge of perishables, sort out the money for the stair cleaners, post my Christmas cards and, essentially, ensure that the kindle is fully charged.  The call-up for jury service remains a bit of a problem, but we'll have to wait and see ...

I see the temperature in Spain is 16 degrees (C), so a slight uplift from here.  Now if only Ryanair can transport me without too much hassle, life will be back to normal.

   

Leggings for men

Don't know what all the fuss is about.  In my day, we knew them as long johns.  Very convenient they were when Jack Frost came to call.

 

How to win friends and influence people

Probably not a good idea to throw out insults:

Celebrity gardener Alan Titchmarsh was yesterday branded "a complete muppet" by a Cabinet minister, for criticising the Government's policies on the countryside.

Owen Paterson, the Environment Secretary, issued the colourful rebuke after the television presenter and author questioned the response to ash dieback disease and warned that the Conservative Party had lost its roots in rural areas.

By all means, argue your corner with facts and policies (if there are such), but calling people names is just childish.

 

Straws, camels and all that

I think that I am beginning to understand how Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs is failing to catch the tax dodgers.  The Independent explains:

More than half a million families will be made to prove to tax inspectors how much they are spending on childcare or whether their children are in full-time education under new rules buried in the small print of George Osborne's Autumn Statement.

Some 80,000 households which claim child tax credits for pre-school children will have to send evidence to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) of the amount they are paying a nursery, child-minder or nanny over a 10-week period. A further 500,000 families with youngsters aged between 16 and 19 who are in full-time education and are therefore eligible for child tax credits will have to send proof, in the form of letters from schools or colleges, to HMRC, rather than "self-certify" as they do now.

The Chancellor estimates the new rules will recoup £315m in overpayments in tax credits in the year 2014-15, a further £185m in 2015-16 and £85m the following year. Fraud and error in the tax credits system last year cost the Treasury more than £2.2bn, and Treasury sources said there needed to be tougher measures to claw back taxpayers' money.

Yet there were warnings last night that the new rules would deter some parents – who are at the lower end of the income scale – from claiming tax credits because of the onerous and complex paperwork.

The new rules follow measures imposed on higher earners to provide paperwork to tax inspectors on child benefit. From next month, parents who earn more than £50,000 will lose most of their child benefit and must send payslips or bank statements to HMRC in order to claim back some of the money. Child benefit is being axed altogether from households where one earner is on a salary of more than £60,000.

And all this at a time when Slasher Osborne is hacking away at staff numbers in HMRC.  Little wonder that the department is dysfunctional, with more and more tasks loaded on the backs of fewer and fewer staff.

Schools

Is this what education has come to?  The Independent reports:

The Education Secretary Michael Gove today announced plans to send former soldiers into classrooms to pass on the “military ethos” to troubled children.

The £1.9 million initiative is aimed at children who have been excluded from schools. Ex-servicemen will visit schools to help instil teamwork, discipline and leadership skills through tailor-made exercises.

Mr Gove said: “Every child can benefit from the values of a military ethos.” He added: “Exclusion from school should never mean exclusion from education.”

And what will soldiers teach the little brats?  How to march in a straight line?  How to obey orders, however stupid?  How to submerge identity in a uniform?  How to wear a chestful of medals?  How to shoot weapons?  How to kill?

Conversation of the week

Here:

Osborne: Er … You remember when I said that I had a cunning plan to reduce the deficit and increase growth?

 Cameron: Y-e-e-e-s?

Osborne: Well, it turns out I got my sums a wee bit wrong and the economy is actually going to carry on tanking until 2018 and we're borrowing a lot more than I imagined.

Cameron: And what does this mean in practice, Ozzy?

Osborne: To put it bluntly, Cams, we're up shit creek without a paddle.

Cameron: But we must do something.

Duncan Smith: How about we make more welfare cuts for the poor and the old? That way they will start to die of malnutrition and other poverty-related conditions. We could call it a cull.

Osborne: I so like the sound of that.

Heremy Junt: Just so long as we're seen to be putting more money into the NHS.

Institute of Fiscal Studies: But you're not.

Junt: Yes we are. Look at the graph.

IFS: Um, you're holding it the wrong way up.

  

Running uphill

Sometimes, it's just no fun to be Chancellor.  There you are, in charge of the signal box, glorying in your determination to direct the economy towards a brighter future.  You pull the levers but nothing seems to work.  The Guardian reports:

Only a fraction of the billions of pounds of new capital spending that George Osborne announced in last year's autumn statement has been spent so far, research by the Guardian has established.

Less than half of the public investment trumpeted by the chancellor last November has been paid out, and none of the £21bn in private investment promised has yet been spent.

Of the key public investment schemes announced last autumn, work has not yet begun on a single one of the half dozen major road schemes published by George Osborne, and £1bn of regional growth fund money has been "allocated" but is now being studied by lawyers before it is actually handed out to help businesses in more deprived areas.

Up to £21bn of new private sector investment was announced, but there is no word on £1bn earmarked for the regulated industries and of £20bn that had been expected to be raised or leveraged by pension funds, just £700m has been committed and not a penny has yet been spent.

Expect more fruitless lever-pulling in today's Autumn Statement.

Babytalk

Even The Guardian gets caught up in the speculation:

Whether the royal couple will have the freedom to wheel a pram down Kensington High Street remains to be seen.

Even an old misanthrope like I am knows that prams are something of a rarity these days. Young parents appear to prefer enormous baby buggies so that they can block supermarket aisles and force reluctant pavement pedestrians into the gutter.

Brrrr! Home

I thought Andalucia was on the chilly side, but ...

Flew to Edinburgh last night.  Plane diverted to Gatwick due to ill passenger.   At Gatwick, aircraft wings iced up and pilot couldn't find credit card for extra fuel.  Three hour flight turned into six hours.  Ryanair offered us a glass of water in recompense.  (Yes. really.)  Six hours without a cigarette ...

Arrived home to a cold, cold flat at 2.30 am.  Even now, I'm blogging with a scarf and bunnet.  Just as well  I'm returning to the delights of Southern Spain next week.